Thursday, November 21, 2013

Weiss-Dodelson: Role of Mechon L'Horaah Beis Din

Guest post by Joseph

I
think it is important to discuss the role that the Mechon L'Horaah Beis
Din played in the Weiss/Dodleson Get saga. Gital Dodelson's entire
complaint against Avrohom Meir Weiss hinges entirely on the siruv
that Machon L'Hora'ah issued. Without that siruv, Dodelson has no case
against Weiss. Therefore, I believe, it is vital to take a deep look at
this issue regarding this beis din and its siruv.

Now, who is this Mechon L'Horaah Beis Din? Who
formed this beis din, which community do they represent and who are
their dayanim and what are their affiliations? Specifically in Gittin
cases does Mechon L'Horaah have a reputation of being pro-Get/pro-women?
Are they know for being exclusively for emes, upholding halacha
rigorously without bending it towards modern/Western sensibilities and
for not giving preference to a favored crowd or toenim or pay-for-play?

With the siruv in hand, Dodelson is running around
calling Weiss a mesarev. Nevertheless, they still cannot call him a
me'agen since no beis din even purports to have ordered Weiss to give a
Get. If Weiss is a mesarev they claim that they can pressure for a Get.
But this claim is baseless since no beis din called him a me'agen. And
being a mesarev is not sufficient to pressure someone to give a Get
according to any shitta.

But the most important question here is on what
basis did Mechon L'Horaah even issue this siruv. As we all know, and as
paskened by Rav Moshe and held as binding halacha by virtually all
quarters, no one today is subject to the jurisdiction of any standing
Beis Din. Anyone summoned to any particular Beis Din can demand the case
be heard in Zabla rather than the Beis Din selected by the plaintiff.
(Halacha also says that the beis din trial is to be held in the
defendant's town, not the plaintiff's town.) And the original Beis Din
must accept a demand for Zabla. Even Mechon L'Horaah accepts as binding
halacha the right for any party to insist on Zabla.

When Dodelson summoned Weiss to the Mechon
L'Horaah's beis din, Weiss responded demanding Zabla - as is his
halachic right. Nevertheless, Mechon L'Horaah blatantly ignored his
request to change the proceedings to Zabla and Mechon L'Horaah continued
pretending that it had jurisdiction over the case. It did so even
though Weiss never accepted its jurisdiction over the case and, thus,
halachicly Mechon L'Horaah has no jurisdiction over this case.

So how, pray tell, does Mechon L'Horaah justify its
action here? And once we recognize that Mechon L'Horaah had no
jurisdiction over this case and thus had no right or basis to issue a
siruv against Weiss, Dodelson's entire case collapses from a halachic
perspective. Weiss is under no Beis Din order to give a Get (no one even
claims any Beis Din ordered Weiss give a Get [which also means no
pressure is permissible to be applied against Weiss according to any
shitta]). And once we established Mechon L'Horaah had no jurisdiction,
it is established that its siruv was invalid and Weiss is not even a
mesarev and there is nothing left to any purported case against him from
a halachic perspective.

Addendum: Another interesting aspect on this topic is that the Mechon
L'Horaah siruv is over the fact that Weiss used arkaos. Now, there is a
dispute between Weiss and Dodelson whether the Heter Arkaos that Weiss
received was valid. Weiss says that since his wife unilaterally ran away
from their marriage without halachicly just cause, and even worse
grabbed their child and took him with her without Avrohom Meir's consent
that she take the child away from their marital home, he was in an
emergency situation over the loss of his child and thus was justified in
receiving his Heter Arkaos. Dodelson disputes his right to arkaos. But
that dispute is really all beside the point at this time and mostly
irrelevant. The reason for that is that the siruv was issued against
Weiss for using arkaos. But the arkaos case is completely done with. It
is inactive and no longer in court. The case is closed. So there is no
more arkaos for Weiss to withdraw from. Therefore Mechon L'Horaah's
siruv, according to anyone, no longer has any standing as the issue is
now moot. But all this is even assuming the siruv was ever valid in the
first place, which as explained above is not the case.

That is factually incorrect. Gital's halachic complaint on Weiss is not based on the demand for compensation for legal costs. Gital is demanding a Get. That is her sole demand. But she has no halachic basis to force Avrohom Meir to give her a Get. As explained, AMW has no obligation under halacha to giver her a Get.

Get real, Extortion is fine. If someone comes to you, and wants your house, and you demand 10 million dollars for it, it is your right. She has no right to the get halachically. I am surprised he is only asking 350k. Besides, how do you know he asked for anything ? Perhaps they had some money or household stuff she took ? I don't know the details. What we are discussing here is Halacha, not that Halacha makes a difference to you. Halachically all she has is him taking her to court, and a Siruv. The Siruv seems to be bogus. It is a huge issue for beis din to be handing down bogus siruvs.

just saying, she's saying it is her main halachic demand. But no beis din, not even her Mechon Lhoraah, actually ever ordered AMW to give GD a Get. Therefore, he has no obligation to give her a Get. He only would have an obligation to give a Get, if a beis din after hearing both sides with both parties present, ordered him to give a Get. That has never happened. Unless it does he is under no obligation to give one.

The seruv is completely irrelevant. Dodelson said she wants put. Therefore, since Weiss hasn't given a get, he is a domestic abuser. Why she left the marriage and destroyed a bayis neeman biyisrael immediately following the birth of the child is completely irrelevant. Whether she kidnapped the child is completely irrelevant.

This isn't just the position of Ora, but the official position of the RCA. Is this also the position of the Roshai yeshiva condemning Weiss and attacking the Weiss and Feinstein families?http://www.rabbis.org/news/article.cfm?id=105781

Incorrect. AMW has no obligation to give a Get unless a Beis Din orders him to give a Get. No B"D ordered him to give a Get.

The RCA is dead wrong. According to the RCA's statement from yesterday, if a wife in a perfectly blissful marriage wakes up one morning and decides marriage is inconvenient and she prefers the freedom of being single, so she moves out and rents herself an apartment and refuses to communicate with her husband, and she then immediately demands a Get from her husband, and her husband pleas for Shalom Bayis, both directly to her and to beis din, according to the RCA she is entitled to a Get-on-demand.

Divorce-on-demand is contrary to 3,000 years of Jewish Law and the Torah.

Thank you for pointing out 'the main event' that the other side chose to ignore and mislead the public with.That brings us to ORA (ym's). They are the champions of misleading and fooling even their own Rabbonim, let alone outside Rabbonim and the public at large.

Now, who is this Mechon L'Horaah Beis Din? Who formed this beis din, which community do they represent and who are their dayanim and what are their affiliations?

What is the answer to the above? This may be more relevant than anything? In any case the beis-din cannot be made of people who are POSSUL LEIDUS which is clearly the case in other Botei dinim. So can anyone confirm who are the Dayanim? Are they Askanim? Ganovim? Politicians? Or perhaps Talmedei Chachomim who only care about Kiddush Hashem?

AMW is following the shita of his great grandfather but only up to a point I.e. he has the right to choose his own bais din IF he is the nitvah.

However rav gestetner and poskim like even yisroel hold zabla of today is corrupt so technically if he is rhe nitvah he should have summonsed her ro rav gestetner's bais din.

The bigger picture is that all the biryonim who are on Gittal's side don't give a ki who ze about halocho. These same biryonim support tamar epstein who walked out of bais din and is a lo tzias dina and mesareves le'DIN.

Similarly you cannot quote either r schachter or r kamenetsky as reliable poskim even if you want to stretch it and hold like those minority of rishobim that in mo'us olai we can be mechayev a get

Sorry folks there is a siruv on r schachter for putting a FAKE siruv on meier kin while his wife was in arko"oys despite the fact that he had deposited a get for her and despite the fact that he wasn't even mazmin meier kin once to bais din.

Yesterday, the RCA released a statement claiming that refusing to deliver or receive a get upon demand is domestic abuse. The RCA does not make any qualifications to this statement. Thus, it it completely irrelevant to the RCA whether a beis din to which the parties brought the matter does not rule that a get should be given. It is also irrelevant if the spouse demanding the get has kidnapped the children and resorted to any other matter of reprehensible and unjustifiable behavior to prevent the children from having a relationship with the other spouse. To the RCA, the kidnapping parent is the innocent victim, and the other parent is the "domestic abuser."

If a get on demand is the halacha, than why bother with a a get in the first place? Why shouldn't a Facebook posting that a spouse has decided to end the relationship be sufficient? It is clear that the RCA believes that the Torah made a mistake in requiring a get. The RCA's position that the Torah is wrong is incongruent with the RCA's statement in July on "Torah Min hashamayim" and much more consistent with the "Open Orthodox" position that Torah is not min hashamyaim that the RCA criticized in July.

http://www.rabbis.org/news/article.cfm?id=105781RCA Condemns Refusal to Deliver or Receive a get Nov 20, 2013 -- The Rabbinical Council of America strongly condemns the refusal of spouses to participate in the delivery and receipt of a get, the Jewish religious divorce process, when the marriage is functionally over and the relationship between the husband and wife has irreversibly ended. We deem the withholding of a get under such circumstances to be an exploitation of the halachic process and a manifestation of domestic abuse.

The RCA reasserts the vital importance of the use of the halachic prenuptial agreement endorsed by our leading rabbinical mentors and by the Beth Din of America; details available at www.theprenup.org. It has a strong track record of preventing agunot by helping to bring couples to beth din in order to resolve issues concerning the get.

"If a get on demand is the halacha, than why bother with a a get in the first place? Why shouldn't a Facebook posting that a spouse has decided to end the relationship be sufficient? It is clear that the RCA believes that the Torah made a mistake in requiring a get."

Comments like this make you sound like an idiot and severly discredit any further argument that you might make.

http://www.rabbis.org/news/article.cfm?id=105768 RCA Statement on Torah Min HaShamayimNov 20, 2013 -- The Rabbinical Council of America strongly condemns the refusal of spouses to participate in the delivery and receipt of a get, the Jewish religious divorce process, when the marriage is functionally over and the relationship between the husband and wife has irreversibly ended. We deem the withholding of a get under such circumstances to be an exploitation of the halachic process and a manifestation of domestic abuse.

The RCA reasserts the vital importance of the use of the halachic prenuptial agreement endorsed by our leading rabbinical mentors and by the Beth Din of America; details available at www.theprenup.org. It has a strong track record of preventing agunot by helping to bring couples to beth din in order to resolve issues concerning the get.

"Jul 31, 2013 -- In recent days there has been much discussion regarding the belief in Torah Min HaShamayim. We maintain that it is necessary not only to assert the centrality of this bedrock principle in broad terms, but also to affirm the specific belief that Moshe received the Torah from God during the sojourn in the wilderness, the critical moment being the dramatic revelation at Sinai. The Rambam and others have included this in in their various Principles of Faith but its centrality is so evident that an appeal to these Principles of Faith is almost superfluous. The very coherence of traditional Jewish discourse concerning the authority of the Torah she-bikhtav and the Torah she-be`al peh rests upon this conviction.

When critical approaches to the Torah's authorship first arose, every Orthodox rabbinic figure recognized that they strike at the heart of the classical Jewish faith. Whatever weight one assigns to a small number of remarks by medieval figures regarding the later addition of a few scattered phrases, there is a chasm between them and the position that large swaths of the Torah were written later-- all the more so when that position asserts that virtually the entire Torah was written by several authors who, in their ignorance, regularly provided erroneous information and generated genuine, irreconcilable contradictions. Beyond a shadow of a doubt, none of the abovementioned figures would have regarded such a position as falling within the framework of authentic Judaism.

While we recognize and respect the theological struggles that are a feature of many a modern person's inner religious life, the position in question is unequivocally contrary to the faith requirements of historic Judaism. "

According to your claim of Domestic abuse after the facts, wasn't she the one that abused AMW by marrying him to begin with without truly caring the least about his outlook and hashkofas on life. Is Ve'ahavta lereacho kamocha also irrelevant? If anything is irrelevant, it is ... !

I find it comical that Rav Hershel Schachter is being accused (and has been accused repeatedly in the comments here by Stan and others) of being some kind of ideological feminist.Please take note of the following paper:

The World Socialist Party of the United States accused the Democratic Party and Barack Obama of being right-wingers. Nevertheless despite the far-left accusing the left of being right-wingers, the Democratic Party and Barack Obama are left-wing politicians.

Similarly, even if the far left accused Rabbi Hershel Schachter or not being a leftist, RHS is very much on the left-wing of Orthodoxy. Not the far-left but certainly the left.

Without any info about Weiss-Dodelson, I can only address other issues discussed in this thread.

Mechon LeHora'ah in Monsey is neither pro-women nor pro-men. I have interacted with them several times, watched numerous cases go through that beis din, and have connections to some of the dayanim there. I have found them decent and fair, without propensities to either side.

To the OP that was questioning the role of this BD, I cannot state anything conclusively without knowledge of facts of this case. But I have had situations in which batei din issued a seruv for failure to appear or for arkaos. These are situations in which the subject of the seruv has been given ample warning to connect with the beis din and provide them with information to support their failure to appear or the going to secular court. When there is no compliance with this, the BD eventually issues a seruv. It is not a knee jerk reaction, but rather one that follows extensive efforts to resolve the issue.

The nitva has the option to respond to a hazmonoh with Zabla, but the summoning BD by virtue of being the contact of record needs to verify the Zabla arrangement. I have observed people exploiting the Zabla option to postpone BD intervention indefinitely.

Specifically in the Weiss/Dodelson case, Weiss responded to Mechon LeHora'ah. He told them he wants Zabla and he gave Mechon LeHora'ah the Dayan he chose for Zabla. Mechon LeHora'ah ignored it and issued a siruv. They have never explained why they ignored Weiss' response for Zabla. They haven't answered and explained it to Weiss or to anyone else.

They have no natural jurisdiction over the case (neither party resides in Monsey and they are not the bais din ha'ir of Monsey) so they are not entitled to demand that the zabla be verified to their satisfaction.

This post is complete rubbish. It raises questions and plants seeds of doubt about Machon L'horaa and its integrity without answering any questions. Instead of asking "Who are these people?" as if to say that the entire BD is some mysterious cabal, why not call them up or do some research and find out whether the rabanim are reputable and accepted. With respect to Zabla - it is not sufficient to simply state that you wish to go to Zabla. You need to pick a reputable and acceptable "borrer". You can not respond to a hazmana by stating that your best friend will serve as your borrer and therefore, plaintiff's refusal to submit to that solution is permission to go to secular court. Weiss's response was not sufficient. Had he picked another BD and submitted to that jurisdiction, perhaps he would be justified. He didnt. He simply asserted his right based on the Debreciner - who has been niftar for 20 years and whose hand written note does not apply to Weiss.Here is the bottom line: Dodelson is entitled to a divorce proceeding by a Beth Din whose gittin are accepted throughout the world. Everything hinges on the acceptability of Rav Gestetner to be a judge and mesader get. WITHOUT EXCEPTION - the rabbinic concensus is that he is not acceptable or legitimate. (I have shown in the past how he plays fast and loose with the shulchan aruch and proper rules of procedure). For goodness sake, Weiss cant even get his uncle Rav Dovid to support Gestetner. Instead he has to say that the seruv is moot because both parties agreed to arbitrate. But that isnt true. So, until one reputable dayan or gadol supports Gestetner, it remains an illegitimate response to a hazmana.

Weiss DID pick reputable and acceptable borrer. And he provided it to Machon L'horaa in response to their communications with him. Machon L'horaa never responded to Weiss' providing a borer. They never said they have a problem with Weiss' selected borer. (The borer is acceptable in all of the many butei dinim he has participated in.) Machon L'horaa never even answered Weiss' on his borer selection and request for Zabla.

Therefore Machon L'horaa has and had no jurisdiction on this case once Weiss asked for Zabla and selected a borer. Weiss never accepted Machon L'horaa's jurisdiction and no beis din has jurisdiction unless accepted by both parties or unless its Zabla.

Eize Hu,That is NOT the Feistein position. Rav Dovid does not contest the legitimacy or objectivity of Machon Lehoraa. He thinks that the seruv is not an issue because they agreed to arbitrate. Absent and arbitration agreement, that is just not true.If Rav Dovid would come out and say what you just said, you would have a case.The same goes with Gestetner's bitul seruv. It is worthless because even the Feinstein's wont grant it legitimacy.

James: Rav Dovid has the mediation effort by Ronnie Greenwald as the least of many reasons why the siruv is invalid. Much bigger reasons are a) because Weiss never accepted the jurisdiction of Machon Lehoraa and therefore with lack of acceptance by both parties they never had jurisdiction over the case and b) Weiss gave Machon Lehoraa a borer,Rav Wolhendler, for Zabla and as such all beis din was required to be done in Zabla not Machon Lehoraa.

Superintendent the only thing that is laughable but no laughing matter is what r herschel schachter has done in 2 very well publicized cases - one the kub case where the wife went directly to arko"oys and secobly in the epstein case where she unilaterally absconded from bais din. In both these cases of extreme halachik violations by the respective female r schachter still had the azus ponim to issue siruvim against the man.

And you claim he is not a feminist. Compared to who? He has seriouslt violated the halocho. Can you even sight me one case where the said rabbi ever put a siruv on a woman and or came out very vociferouly against a woman for halachik violations the same way he disgracefully picked on kin and friedman. QED. I rest my case.

Why did the RCA suddenly issue this statement yesterday? What happened yesterday? Nothing other than for the past seven days on the Dodelson-support Facebook page of Dodelson's publicist and P.R. consultant Shira Dicker, they have been urging supporters to call the RCA to pressure the RCA to publicly support Dodelson.

And the RCA is the type of organization that responds to pressure. They often lick the end of their finger and stick it into the air to see which way the wind is blowing. They then change their policies and stances to suit the popular demand of the moment. Even if that is in contravention to Jewish tradition or law.

James you are a big time hypocrite. Remember a year ago i challenged you with serious halachik violations of the BDA and you refused to answer any of them.Between either you or Eddie I don't remember which one, one of you told this site that they were busy with Elul. now two Elul's have come and gone. Answer those serious violations of halocho. People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

recently you said you did not believe in bais Din so who the heck are you to start deciding in something you don't even believe in. I knpow DT will be reluctant to post this because of the harsh language but frankly you deserve it.

Just look at the kefirah that has just come out of the RCA about Gittin and you have the gall to criticize rabbi gestetner when you keep quiet about this prikas ol.

lastly rav gestetner does not need R Dovid Feinstein's haskomo. I will leave it at that.

Stan,Your questions are irrelevant. The BDA has nothing to do with this case. Your response to every comment is to ask irrelevant questions and attack irrelevant parties. I am not engaging in a discussion about the BDA where it is not relevant.You did not understand my comments about BD.

PS: This is the time of the yevonim and we see the misyavnim of the RCA are at it again.

They are lucky Reb Menashe hakoton is no longer alive. He could have wiped the floor himself with all of them put together. And this is not even a nais of rabim beyad meatim or a yochid. These biryonim are despicable. Not a peep from them about the cattle prods or the niyuf of Rav Avromi Rubins moredes. There are not atrong enough words to condemn them.

Doubt this will be posted but these amei ho'oretz masquerading as rabbis must be condemned in the strongest terms.

"But the arkaos case is completely done with. It is inactive and no longer in court. The case is closed. So there is no more arkaos for Weiss to withdraw from. Therefore Mechon L'Horaah's siruv, according to anyone, no longer has any standing as the issue is now moot."======================

Rabbi Eidensohn, a brief consistency check:Would you make this same statement when a wife goes to arko'os, and is awarded majority custody and alimony and child support?

Daniel S: If someone is goes to arkaos keneged halacha and attains a result in arkaos that is keneged halacha, then the other party has the right to demand that the party who went to arkaos surrender whatever he/she gained in arkaos.

So to answer your hypothetical, the wife would have to give up the custody arrangement, alimony and child support that she achieved in arkaos keneged halacha and instead have to allow beis din to make arrangements for custody, alimony and child support that are according to halacha and have beis din's halachic decision replace the arkaos decision.

So to carry over that point to the case at hand, if one of the parties here achieved something in arkaos that they are not halachicly entitled to, that party will have to agree to let beis din re-decide the issue according to halacha and accept that decision to replace the arkaos decision.

Ben Torah:So if I sue you in arakos against halacha and lose, I can go to BD to try and get my money back? That can not be the case. When you have a heter to go to arkaos you are submitting to their ruling.

James: Incorrect. If you sue someone kneged halacha, the party you are suing a) can have beis din force you to drop your arkaos court case and b) force you to give back anything arkaos took from them and gave to you.

When someone gets a "heter arkaos" that means they are going to arkaos halachicly, not Kneged Halacha. Typically a heter arkaos is issued if another party wronged someone in a way that constitutes an emergency (i.e. they took his child away from his home) and requires immediate remedial action or b) the other party refused to follow an order of a competent jurisdictional beis din.

Even with a heter arkaos if the arkaos court awards less than the party with the heter is halachicly entitled to, that party can seek additional redress in beis din.

A toveah is in arko"oys at the minimum while he/ she is benefitting from the rulibgs of arko"oys. .However I never saw you protesting all the female mordos in arko"oys before. The weiss have an emergency hetter to stop the kidnapping of his child.

All those in support of gital are not concerned in the least for halocho so cut it out. ou joined with ORA which hates halocho and violates it with impunity.

the behavior of gittal can mist accurately be described as the behavior of a young spoilt brat who is very at home with the misyavnim of the RCA and a very, very selfish uncouth individual mocking the Torah and AMW to the world.

it would be very revealing to see her testimony to the court. I have no doubt it would make her lookveven worse..

1) The siruv (assuming you even hold it has any validity) was ONLY for not going to Beis Din to respond to the allegation that he used arkoyos (secular court) on the custody issue. It has nothing to do about giving a Get. So to resolve that siruv (again assuming it is a valid siruv altogether) against him, Weiss only needs to respond to the Beis Din case against him and explain why he is in arkoyos and remove himself from arkoyos. Once the arkoyos (secular court) case is closed, and he explains that to the Beis Din, the siruv against him (even if it were ever valid) is gone.

Even while the above siruv was active, it only applied to having Weiss 1) come to Beis Din and 2) answer why he went to arkoyos regarding custody and child support. Nothing at all to do about giving a Get. So any permissible permission due to the siruv was ONLY to pressure Weiss to come to Beis Din and respond to the arkoyos issue. Any other pressure, such as pressuring him to give a Get, is impermissible and causes a Get Me'usa.

2) Someone is a "meagen" if, and only if, a Beis Din case with both parties present was heard and that Beis Din ruled that the husband is halachicly obliged to give a Get, and the husband then fails to give a Get despite the Beis Din order for him to give a Get.

In this case, a) there never even was a case from any party ever brought to Beis Din demanding a Get b) there never was a Beis Din case (hearing) with both parties present where a Get was demanded and c) there was never any ruling by any Beis Din that the husband is halachicly obligated to give a Get.

Therefore no one ever could even allege (and from all the noise in this case I've never heard it even alleged) that Weiss is a "meagen". And since there is no Beis Din ruling that Weiss is mechuyav to give a Get, therefore Weiss is no mechuyav to give a Get. Indeed, Dodelson never even asked any Beis Din to demand that Weiss give her a Get!

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Rav Zev Leff recommends my 3 books on Child & Domestic Abuse

Click on picture to hear excerpt from Jan. 2012 Kav L'Noar conference. "I want to first give hakoras hatov to Dr. Baruch Shulem who provided me with Daniel Eidensohn's books on child abuse and domestic abuse which offered me many many sources and it gave me many many ideas to be able to deal with the subject properly. And I thank them and I recommend those books to everyone who is interested in getting a good foundation what the issues are in this very important topic."